Thursday, March 22, 2012

unnamed sound sculpture

The basic idea of the project is built upon the consideration of creatinga moving sculpture from the recorded motion data of a real person. Forour work we asked a dancer to visualize a musical piece (Kreukeltape byMachinenfabriek) as closely as possible by movements of her body. She wasrecorded by three depth cameras (Kinect), in which the intersection of theimages was later put together to a three-dimensional volume (3d point cloud),so we were able to use the collected data throughout the further process.The three-dimensional image allowed us a completely free handling of thedigital camera, without limitations of the perspective. The camera also reactsto the sound and supports the physical imitation of the musical piece by theperformer. She moves to a noise field, where a simple modification of therandom seed can consistently create new versions of the video, each offeringa different composition of the recorded performance. The multi-dimensionalityof the sound sculpture is already contained in every movement of the dancer,as the camera footage allows any imaginable perspective.

The body â€“ constant and indefinite at the same time â€“ â€œburstsâ€ the spacealready with its mere physicality, creating a first distinction between the selfand its environment. Only the body movements create a reference to theotherwise invisible space, much like the dots bounce on the ground to give ita physical dimension. Thus, the sound-dance constellation in the video doesnot only simulate a purely virtual space. The complex dynamics of the bodymovements is also strongly self-referential. With the complex quasi-static,inconsistent forms the body is â€œpaintingâ€, a new reality space emerges whosesimulated aesthetics goes far beyond numerical codes.